Move over Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. Discussing the Divine Comedy with Dante is a spectacular gigantic painting by the Chinese artists Dai Dudu, Li Tiezi, and Zhang An (2006, oil on canvas). The original is an impressive 20′ x 8.5′ (6m x 2.6m). If you go to this link, there is a very large high-quality image that lets you hover your mouse over faces to see who they are, with a Wikipedia link. Where’s Lewis Carroll?

Discussing the Divine Comedy with Dante - by Dai Dudu, Li Tiezi, and Zhang An (2006, oil on canvas)

Hint: Lewis Carroll is literally hiding. I love how Darwin and Noah seem to be the same person. Also, when you click on the camel, it takes you to a list of “celebrities that look like camels.” There’s a further discussion of some of the clever quirks of the painting here at Convivium. For instance, “Leonardo da Vinci worked for evil rulers such as Cesare Borgia and here he listens politely to Stalin’s mad schemes.”